BSP Supremo Mayawati’s two-year-old video is edited and shared with false claims

Claim

Rating

Explanation

Election campaigns for Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections have now come to a halt several hours ago as the state is voting today, on 17th November 2023. But the social media has been abuzz even after the mandatory restrictions on political parties for campaigning have kicked in. An image and a video featuring Mayawati are going viral on social media with claims that she had called for voters in Madhya Pradesh to vote for BJP rather than wasting their electoral right by voting for Congress. This was shared by Prashant Umrao, BJP’s spokesperson in Uttar Pradesh on November 15th but the post has been deleted.

https://twitter.com/SaffronSunanda/status/1724833764692689376

However, many other social media users have made similar claims which can be seen here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.

What is the Truth?

After analysing the keyframes of the video along with some keyword search, we found a tweet from ANI published on 29 October 2020. This was reported in other news outlets as well such as Business Standard, India TV, The Print etc. Back in 2020, Mayawati actually insisted her supporters and the public to vote for BJP rather Samajwadi Party to defeat them in the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Council elections. Quite interestingly, she backtracked her statements in a couple days stating claimed she would rather become a ‘sanyasi’ than to ally with the BJP.

#WATCH BSP Chief Mayawati says that her party will vote for BJP or any party's candidate in future UP MLC elections, to defeat Samajwadi Party's second candidate.

"Any party candidate, who'll be dominant over SP's 2nd candidate, will get all BSP MLAs' vote for sure," she said. pic.twitter.com/ki4W6ZAwgE

— ANI (@ANI) October 29, 2020

The viral video also has many edits in the audio, and there are several visible cut marks, which give away the fact that the video was tampered with and stitched together. This video has been used earlier in February 2022 to create a similar misinformation.

Conclusion

This is an old video from 2020 related to Uttar Pradesh MLC elections, which is now being shared with misleading claims about Madhya Pradesh elections.

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